Tag Archives: sexual ethics

The Freedom To Be Wrong

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A reflection by Sarah

“You think you’re never wrong, Sarah.” My mother would say that to me at least once a week for my entire upbringing. Upon remembering this, my first instinct is to retort, “I do think I’m wrong sometimes. I just don’t like to be. And Mom isn’t so keen on being wrong herself.” But that’s my pride talking, and it’s Lent, so I should probably spend some time praying about this attitude. Anyway…

I don’t think many people are comfortable with being wrong. One doesn’t have to look very far on the Internet to find evidence of this. Almost every popular news article, blog post, photo, or meme a person can find online will be followed by a string of angry, vitriolic comments aimed at the author/creator or other commenters. Civil dialogue is becoming a lost art, and there are many reasons for this, but I think one of the most significant is that no one wants to be wrong. And not only do we want to avoid being wrong, but in the process of proving that we are right, we pat ourselves on the back for our ability to crush, slander, and decimate those with whom we disagree.

I enjoy winning an argument just as much as the next person, and that’s probably not a good thing…but I don’t think intellectual vainglory is the only reason humans behave like this. I think more often than most of us would like to admit, we fear the possibility of being wrong. Or at least I do. Sometimes, being wrong comes with a high price–losing friends, respect from others, or even the ability to engage fully with one’s faith community. Rarely in life have I found a space where being wrong has felt totally safe. As a child, I found that wrongness carried with it the consequence of being pointed at and ridiculed, whether by a teacher or by other children. In church, I learned that being wrong meant being marked as a troublemaker. As a university student with a severe lack of self-confidence, I wasn’t sure I belonged there in the first place and was terrified that if I said something incorrect in class, my professors would think I was stupid. So despite my general tendency toward chattiness, regrettably I remained silent in several courses. Now as an instructor of university courses in theology and religious studies, I still feel a small twinge of anxiety mounting inside me if I accidentally make an incorrect statement and a particularly smug nineteen-year-old member of the class calls me out on it. I‘ve learned that it’s best to acknowledge my incorrectness and move forward rather than justify to the students why I made the error, but that doesn’t do much to alleviate the embarrassment when I receive my end-of-term evaluation report and see that a student has commented, “This professor shouldn’t be teaching theology because in class on April 26, she mixed up the definitions for dulia and latria.”

Because of my own experience with the fear of being wrong, I empathize with my students who display the same fear. When we’re discussing controversial theological issues in class, I strive to create an environment in which all voices are welcomed and respected, but that doesn’t stop some students from clamming up after hearing a self-assured freshman proclaim, “You’re a heretic and an idiot!” before I can call a halt to his impending diatribe. It is neither comforting nor helpful to get that sort of response from another student if, for example, you’re a young woman who has experienced mistreatment by men within a church community, and as a result you’ve come to the belief that women’s ordination would solve this problem within your Christian tradition. Every semester, I try to teach my students that discussing theological issues is not about winning arguments; it’s about exploring the questions and coming to a greater understanding of one’s faith…and that rarely is a person converted from heterodoxy to orthodoxy while cowering in fear and anxiously waiting out a sanctimonious theological tirade.

One of the greatest benefits I’ve reaped as a result of beginning this blog with Lindsey is that I now have a space where it’s safe for me to voice what I’m thinking and be sharpened by the constructive criticism we receive from readers. It’s okay for me to make mistakes, to be wrong, and even to be stupid…and I’m glad for that, because some days I feel as though I’m making more gaffes than a presidential candidate on debate night. Last week, I was reading a post from my friend Eve Tushnet’s blog, and nearly jumped out of my seat while shouting, “YES!!!” as I came across the following bit:

“So much of the ‘conservative’ Christian world seems terrified of anything which might be misinterpreted as saying gay sex is OK. The fear is always, always that we might say something wrong, and not ever that our silence might itself cause despair, scandal, and loss of faith. My favorite variation of this approach is, ‘Well, I know what you’re saying, but other people might misunderstand.’ I am pretty sure that ordinary people in the pews are already interpreting–and, I hope, misinterpreting–the huge echoey nothing they hear from their churches about gay or same-sex attracted Christians’ futures.

I know that I will say dumb stuff about this issue and mess up. So will everyone who speaks about it. The response to our acknowledgment of universal, unavoidable failure should be humble willingness to retract and at times repent, not unwillingness to ever act.”

Within our past two months of blogging, I’ve seen the content of that first paragraph playing out in spades, but not just from conservative Christians. Friends with a traditional sexual ethic have told me, “I’d be more willing to support your writing project if you would state in most of your posts that you agree with the Church’s teaching that gay sexual activity is sinful. If you don’t start doing that, people are going to start doubting what you say about your own commitment to celibacy.” People on the opposite end of the spectrum seem just as concerned about not saying anything that could be construed as lack of support for those with a modern, liberal sexual ethic. Some friends have said, “You should make a statement of loving acceptance for couples in relationships like mine. Otherwise, people will see you as just another hateful, judgmental, Side B blog. You wouldn’t want anyone to see you as self-righteous.”

We can’t stay true to ourselves while making everyone happy, but we can try to foster meaningful conversation among people who really care about these issues, no matter where they stand ideologically. But in order to do that, we need the freedom to be wrong. We need to know that we can write from the place we’re at right now, even if that means two years down the road we look back at some of our posts and say, “Golly ned, that was a problematic statement.”

I’m grateful to have learned since my days on the other side of the university classroom that being silent is far worse than being wrong, and–thanks again to my struggle with pride–I’m still in the process of accepting that retractions, apologies, and repentances are all part of being human. I’m well aware that many of our readers think that we are wrong, or that I, personally, am wrong about one thing or another. As far as I’m concerned, that’s a positive thing. Your challenges are good for me, and my responses are probably good for you too. The expectation that everyone (or anyone) who discusses issues of sexual ethics is going to do so in the most perfect, kind, non-alienating, and theologically orthodox manner 100% of the time hinders dialogue. Sometimes, I wonder how much more productively we might be able to talk about this if everyone involved would drop the pretenses and accept that God and the Church are strong enough to withstand all our blunders.

Comment Policy: Please remember that we, and all others commenting on this blog, are people. Practice kindness. Practice generosity. Practice asking questions. Practice showing love. Practice being human. If your comment is rude, it will be deleted. If you are constantly negative, argumentative, or bullish, you will not be able to comment anymore. We are the sole moderators of the combox.

The Problematic Comparison of Homosexuality and Addiction

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A reflection by Sarah

It would be impossible for me to count the number of times I’ve heard some form of comparison between homosexuality and addiction. Usually, these analogies come from well-meaning people who are trying to make sense of experiences foreign to their own. My first two questions to these folks are usually, “Do you identify as gay or have a close relationship with someone who does?” and “Do you personally experience addiction or have a close relationship with someone who does?” In most cases, the answer is either “no” to both or “yes” to one but not the other.

A number of Christian bloggers have discussed the problematic nature of comparing homosexuality with addiction, most from within the context of a liberal sexual ethic. Katie Grimes at Women and Theology raises some valid points as she argues that the comparison of homosexuality and alcoholism “fails as a comparison and it fails as an argument against homosexuality.” Another example comes from Registered Runaway, who has written on how comparing homosexuality with a variety of human problems fosters the use of shallow talking points as the Church grapples with how best to approach the LGBT community: “[Analogies] minimize us. Patronize us. They make us strain to see Christ through all of the mud being thrown.” In both posts, there’s much I can relate to as a gay person. I agree with both authors’ declarations that the homosexuality/addiction analogy is flawed, but when reading articles on this topic in general, more often than not I find myself feeling uncomfortable with discussions of where the analogy fails. I see this discomfort as rooted in the fact that I am both a gay person and a recovering addict.

Perhaps unintentionally, some–though not all–discussions about problems with the homosexuality/addiction comparison imply the sentiment, “Don’t vilify gay people. We/they aren’t like those addicts.” Frequently I hear, “Addiction ruins lives and homosexuality doesn’t,” or “Addiction occurs when a person repeatedly uses a substance or engages in a behavior, eventually becoming unable to stop, but gay people don’t choose to become gay.” I don’t contest what these statements have to say about me as a gay person. I have never seen my sexual orientation as an illness or malady, I didn’t choose to be attracted to women, and being gay certainly has not ruined my life. Yet there’s still something in the aforementioned assertions that I perceive as making light of an important aspect of my experience. In discussion of the homosexuality/addiction analogy, there must be a way forward that honors the lived experiences of gay people, addicts, and those of us lucky enough to be part of both demographics.

In this post, I’d like to make an attempt at that forward movement by approaching this topic from a different angle than I’ve seen in other places. I’d like to discuss why the homosexuality/addiction analogy does as much a disservice to addicts as it does to members of the gay community. I should state upfront that I have no professional expertise in the area of addictions or psychology. My entire education on this topic has come from the school of hard knocks. Therefore, the rest of this post will focus on my own personal experience. My intention is not to make generalizations about all gay people or all addicts. In my 29 years of life, I have faced multiple kinds of addiction. I don’t think it’s important at this time to name all of them, but suffice it to say my experience includes both substance and behavioral addictions. Because I’ve referenced it before and because it is the addiction with which I have the most recovery experience, I’ll use my struggle with bulimia as my primary example. If you’re having trouble understanding why one might conceive of bulimia as an addiction, read this. Now, I’m going to highlight three statements I’ve heard people say when they are comparing homosexuality to addiction. Their words are quoted and in bold print.

“Gay sexual desire is just like an addict’s craving for his/her drug of choice.”

In addition to the fact that I don’t know a single non-sex-addicted person, gay, straight, or otherwise, who would describe his/her sexual desires as “cravings,” I see this statement as problematic because shows a profound misapplication of the term “craving.” In addiction studies terms, a craving is a psychological urge to use a particular drug or engage in a particular behavior. Cravings are also part of withdrawal from use of said substance or behavior. When I’ve said in the past, “I’m experiencing a craving” in relation to bulimia, that has meant, “I’m experiencing the urge to acquire a large amount of food, eat it, and purge by means of vomiting.” Several years ago when I was at my lowest point, I was facing these cravings multiple times a day and my entire schedule revolved around getting food and finding places and times to devour it and purge. As I became increasingly ill, I fell into the irrational belief that I wouldn’t be able to survive a day without bulimic behaviors. When my rituals were interrupted, the cravings remained present until I found some way to engage—even if that meant the only place for carrying out the process was an alley behind the nearest grocery store, and the only consumable product I could afford that would be voluminous enough to purge was a gallon of water. Cravings are intense and baffling. Overcoming them takes an incredible amount of work and support, and it’s hard. Dealing with cravings is not as simple as applying a bit of willpower and saying, “I’m deciding not to do this behavior/use this substance, even though I desire it.”

None of what I have been describing thus far is anything remotely like my experience of attraction to other women. When I experience sexual desire, I don’t find myself thinking, “If I don’t have sex, I’m going to die.” I couldn’t possibly imagine scheduling my entire life, or even a portion of my life, around seeking out opportunities for engaging in sexual activity. Even the sex addicts I know would never conflate the level of sexual desire experienced by most people with the cravings of sexual addiction.

I find it offensive that increasingly often, non-addicted people use the word “addiction” to describe something that they enjoy immensely and couldn’t imagine living without. I’ve seen a “List of Things I’m Addicted To” trend emerge at different times on Facebook, in which people will list items such as “my best friends” or “my children.” This is a perfect example of how acceptable it has become to misapply the term “addiction.” A person who truly is addicted to his/her best friends or children has an unhealthy attachment to those people, and I seriously doubt that most would be comfortable broadcasting such a reality proudly on Facebook. As I see it, the term “craving” gets misapplied in a similar way when a person compares homosexuality to addiction. Implying that my sexual inclinations are the same as my urges for bulimic behavior belittles the constant work I’ve had to do over the years to progress in recovery.

“There might be a genetic element to homosexuality, but there’s also a genetic element to addiction, and that doesn’t mean we excuse addiction.”

There are many possibilities for interpreting this statement as problematic (I’ll be glad to discuss more with you in the comments), but here I’ll focus on my observation that it assumes both homosexuality and addiction are behaviors and nothing more. A person who makes this statement assumes that being gay is solely about having sex. I’ve been told before that because I’m celibate, there’s no reason for me to use the label “gay.” I strongly disagree and I would like to write on that topic in the future, but for now I’ll link you to the work of my friend Joshua Gonnerman, who is also a celibate gay Christian.

A person who makes this statement also assumes that addiction is solely about feeding insatiable cravings for one’s substance or behavior of choice and has nothing to do with underlying psychological and/or spiritual problems. My experience with bulimia (and other addictions too) has taught me that reducing it to its behavioral aspect not only ignores the bigger picture of what might be leading to the behavior, but also impedes real progress in recovery. I didn’t start engaging in bulimic behavior because one day I decided it would be nice to become addicted to gorging myself and vomiting. Numerous factors including nutrition, trauma, anxiety, and the way I felt about myself all played a role. In order to attain any level of recovery beyond the superficial “just stop eating and throwing up!” I had to deal with all of those complicating factors and many more. At different points, I spent months in inpatient and residential eating disorder treatment facilities. Though most of these experiences proved beneficial in helping me to stop bulimic behaviors, the majority did very little in terms of helping me construct a way of life outside the facility that would no longer include binging and purging. Those treatment experiences that were most helpful assisted me in focusing not only on behaviors, but also on the underlying reasons for engaging in those behaviors in the first place.

The work of recovering from any addiction involves an honest and thorough look at the darkest parts of oneself. Any person who has worked a 12-step recovery program knows that there is a noteworthy distinction between “dry” and “sober.” Stopping behaviors and abstaining from substances is all a person needs to do in order to maintain dryness, but doing the painful, arduous work that holistic recovery necessitates is what leads an addict to the gift of sobriety. Most people who prefer different, non-12-step types of recovery programs and approaches also would likely agree with the basic idea that recovery is about about so much more than stopping behaviors. Reducing the struggle of a person who experiences addiction to “drinking too much,” “using illegal drugs,” “eating and throwing up,” etc. effectively denies all aspects of recovery that aren’t purely behavioral, thereby implying that recovery merely involves abstinence.

“A gay person involved in a same-sex friendship or ‘celibate’ partnership is no different from an alcoholic tending bar/a prescription drug addict working in a pharmacy/a bulimic working in a restaurant, and it can only lead to temptation.”

Being in a celibate partnership, I think it’s probably obvious that I disagree with the assumptions this statement makes about gay people. At best, it incorrectly suggests that if we experience sexual attraction, we are constantly “at risk” for acting upon that attraction. At worst, it presumes that we are sexually attracted to every person of the same sex. The lack of logic becomes clear when one applies this statement to straight people’s interactions with the opposite sex. I doubt anyone would argue that a straight man must necessarily be attracted to all women, that a straight woman must necessarily be attracted to all men, or that any person in a heterosexual relationship must be playing with fire just by being in that relationship.

This statement also misrepresents addicts by implying that exposure to situations involving substances with which we struggle will necessarily trigger us to use or engage in the addictive behavior. Furthermore, it could be taken to imply that being around said substance or having the opportunity to engage in said behavior is the only possible trigger for a recovering addict. There have been times when specific foods have made me feel uncomfortable or caused negative associations that needed processing. However, when I’ve felt cravings for bulimic behavior, the impetus for those urges hasn’t been cheesecake, pizza, and tacos. Almost always, the trigger has been stressful interactions with family, seemingly unmanageable emotions, or memories of a traumatic event–and often, it’s a combination of all three. Simply being around food, even the food items I consider most challenging, does not trigger me. Being around other substances I have used in the past does not trigger me either. I know plenty of alcoholics who work as bartenders and prescription drug addicts who work as pharmacists, doctors, and nurses, and most of them do not find their work environments triggering. Of course, there are recovering addicts who do find it triggering to be in the same vicinity as the substances they have used and I do not intend to deny their experiences, but it is incorrect to suggest that this is true for all people suffering from or recovering from addiction.

I hope my personal reflections have been helpful in clarifying some ways the homosexuality/addiction comparison is problematic, both in terms of its incorrect characterization of gay people and in its false representation of addicts and addiction. While these three iterations of the analogy are the ones I hear most often, they are not the only forms of comparison people regularly make between homosexuality and addiction. If there are others you would find beneficial to discuss, feel free to leave them in the comments section.

Comment Policy: Please remember that we, and all others commenting on this blog, are people. Practice kindness. Practice generosity. Practice asking questions. Practice showing love. Practice being human. If your comment is rude, it will be deleted. If you are constantly negative, argumentative, or bullish, you will not be able to comment anymore. We are the sole moderators of the combox.

The Slippery Slope

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As people learn about our vocation as a celibate couple, another of the many questions we receive on a regular basis is, “How do you deal with temptation?” The people asking this question are interested in learning how we avoid crossing over “the line” into sex. Some people have been counseled by their own spiritual directors to avoid certain forms of physical intimacy lest these forms of intimacy increase the temptation to have sex. Indeed, it seems that many people view sexual intimacy as a giant cliff, where sharing any degree of physical closeness has the potential to push people towards sex. But as we see it, the idea that physical affection is a slippery slope that will push people towards violating their celibate vocations is highly problematic for many reasons.

Not all people experience touch in the same way, and touch is not necessarily sexual. The slippery slope argument depends on the idea that specific forms of touch have an exceptionally high likelihood of activating a person’s desire for sexual intimacy. When spiritual directors say things like, “No frontal hugs” to young LGB Christians who want to cultivate a celibate vocation, what these spiritual directors are saying is that there’s something about a frontal hug that causes the people sharing that hug to start automatically undressing one another, or that there’s something about a frontal hug that causes the body to yearn for more skin-to-skin contact. While we can acknowledge that some people do experience frontal hugs in this sort of way, we personally think that a majority of celibate and sexually abstinent people are able to share healthy hugs that have not spurred a desire for sexual intimacy. Some people, like Lindsey, experience hugs as a language where it is exceptionally comfortable to speak “hug” in many different situations. When spiritual directors use the slippery slope argument, they can intentionally or unintentionally pathologize a person’s natural predisposition for using touch to communicate nonsexual love.

People using the slippery slope argument tend to have a common list of “don’t”s used to establish clear boundaries in relationships and consider these to be common sense. However, these people often forget that standards for appropriate touch are set within communities and cultures and are not necessarily universal. For example, many Muslims and Orthodox Jews would be uncomfortable shaking hands with a person of the opposite sex. Most western Christians would not perceive that sort of touch as inappropriate. What’s taken as “common sense” regarding boundaries in relationships isn’t so common at all. Moreover, the boundaries seem to reflect the spiritual director’s sensibilities about what sorts of affection between two people of the same sex he or she can handle witnessing. The spiritual director asks the LGB person to conform to patterns of affection that he or she has no problem “signing off” on as appropriate. The different comfort levels might explain why some draw “the line” at frontal hugs while others place the boundary at kissing on the lips.

Many people offering advice on this topic filter questions of intimacy in celibate relationship through their own experiences of trying to maintain sexual purity standards before they were married. They will say things like, “When I was younger and unmarried, I had trouble keeping myself chaste.” They tend to compare the LGB person desiring celibacy with their own experiences of trying to remain sexually abstinent through their teen years (or maybe their 20s as well). We think it’s worth pointing out that most teenagers tend to be raging balls of hormones as they are getting a handle on their developing young adult bodies, but that different people come to grips with their hormones in different ways. The experience of a 17-year-old trying to remain sexually abstinent often differs significantly from that of a 38-year-old who has spent 20 years cultivating a celibate vocation. When spiritual directors forget that people experience sexuality differently throughout their lives, they often come down hard, saying that it’s impossible to pursue lifelong celibacy within the context of a relationship. After all, these people profoundly struggled to maintain their own senses of chastity before they married in their early or mid-20s. Sometimes, this can also be true for spiritual directors living their own celibate vocations who may have struggled with remaining chaste as young people. In this case, a spiritual director might also assume that the boundaries associated with his or her particular celibate vocation are the appropriate boundaries for all people pursuing celibate vocations.

More profoundly, the slippery slope argument misrepresents how we cultivate chastity. Often, chastity is understood in terms of purity, virginity, and untouched landscapes. When this term is framed as being only about touch and purity, it is easy to forget that chastity begins with learning to control one’s tongue. On how abstaining from certain kinds of acts can help people cultivate virtue, Tikhon of Zadonsk offered this wisdom: “Let thy mind fast from vain thoughts; let thy memory fast from remembering evil; let thy will fast from evil desire; let thine eyes fast from bad sights: turn away thine eyes that thou mayest not see vanity; let thine ears fast from vile songs and slanderous whispers; let thy tongue fast from slander, condemnation, blasphemy, falsehood, deception, foul language and every idle and rotten word; let thy hands fast from killing and from stealing another’s goods; let thy legs fast from going to evil deeds: Turn away from evil, and do good.” The Roman Catholic Catechism opens with its discussion of chastity with this exhortation (para 2348): “All the baptized are called to chastity. The Christian has ‘put on Christ,’ the model for all chastity. All Christ’s faithful are called to lead a chaste life in keeping with their particular states of life. At the moment of his Baptism, the Christian is pledged to lead his affective life in chastity.” It seems to us that chastity, rightly understood, involves cultivating virtues that allow people to reflect the image and likeness of Christ more fully.

The slippery slope argument falls short of sound spiritual direction for many reasons. It begins by pathologizing natural expressions of physical intimacy. Often, spiritual directors use it to draw the line according to their own boundaries rather than help people discern what kinds of actions promote developing a celibate vocation.  When spiritual directors rely on their own experience of maintaining a state of sexual abstinence, they are usually reflecting on their experiences of being teenagers or young adults and “waiting until marriage.” This focus overlooks that celibate people develop vocations throughout their entire lives. Lastly, the slippery slope argument frames the celibacy question almost exclusively in terms of physical touch. Instead of using the slippery slope argument, we encourage spiritual directors to present celibacy as a vocation that allows people to cultivate virtues associated with imagining Christ-likeness to the world.

Comment Policy: Please remember that we, and all others commenting on this blog, are people. Practice kindness. Practice generosity. Practice asking questions. Practice showing love. Practice being human. If your comment is rude, it will be deleted. If you are constantly negative, argumentative, or bullish, you will not be able to comment anymore. We are the sole moderators of the combox.

Beyond Right and Wrong

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The question of LGBT people in the Church is often framed as a “culture war” issue with two definitive sides. On one side, “progressive” groups advocate for greater acceptance of gay marriage and allowing for sexually active LGBT people to serve at all levels of Church leadership. On the other side, “conservative” groups exhort LGBT people to grow in holiness by resisting all manner of sexual sin, bearing their sexual orientations (and gender dysphoria) as a cross, and struggling to conform to normative expectations of the cisgender, heterosexual majority. Both sides are quick to pronounce their side “right” and the other side “wrong.” Needless to say, we find that the “culture war” approach does little more than wound a lot of LGBT Christians (and their allies) in the crossfire.

Here at A Queer Calling, we have tried to advocate for a different approach that moves beyond right and wrong. We focus on how LGBT people likely have queer callings that need to be actively discerned in the light of Christ. For us, the dominant question is “Where do we see good fruit sprouting as God guides and directs individual LGBT Christians?” We recognize that LGBT people are people above all other descriptors. We believe that God, who is rich in mercy, always wants all people to grow in holiness but does not ask people to address each and every issue in their lives at the same time.

The culture wars have a profoundly negative effect when they dichotomize spiritual direction. Mention your LGB status to a person strongly aligned with the “progressive” camp and he or she just may offer to officiate your wedding. Oh, you’re transgender? No problem, let’s connect you with the nearest trans-friendly physician to help you get started with gender confirmation therapies. Breathe a word about your LGBT status amid “conservative” groups and you’ll likely be issued a celibacy mandate and be cautioned against identifying with your sin. We’d contend that none of these automatic responses adequately conveys the nuances found in authentic spiritual direction where spiritual directors help individuals grow towards Christ in ways that are appropriate for particular people’s unique circumstances.

When time in spiritual direction becomes engulfed by questions of rightness and wrongness, little room is left for discussing, “What is God asking of me at this time in my life? At the present moment, what is God calling me to do or change so that I might draw closer to Him?” This can create a false sense that gay people need the strictest of guidance regarding sexual morality and straight people do not. In reality, virtually every Christian will grapple with questions of sexuality at one time or another. For bisexual Christians, this approach can oversimplify experiencing attraction to both sexes: “Just marry someone of the opposite sex, because heterosexual, married sex is right and gay sex is wrong.” Concerns related to sexual orientation may be conflated with uncertainty about gender identity, and vice versa. Focusing solely on which sexual activities are right and wrong can be painfully alienating to Christians with gender identity questions. Especially in conservative Christian circles, any kind of gender identity question can be viewed as a cause of forbidden same-sex sexual desire. Beliefs about the rightness or wrongness of gay sex do little to help, guide, or comfort a person who is coping with gender dysphoria.

Regularly, we have experienced pressure to make a public declaration either that “Gay sex is a sin” or that “Gay sex is not a sin.” It has been suggested more than once by readers that because we have chosen not to make such a statement, we are, at best, unable to make up our minds about our convictions, or at worst, secretive about them for some sinister purpose. Such theories about our motives leave us wondering why reaching a theologically correct belief about the rightness or wrongness of same-sex sexual activity has become the endpoint for discussion about LGBT issues in many Christian traditions. Often in Christian communities, one’s willingness to offer an apologetic for either a liberal or conservative sexual ethic becomes the litmus test for one’s faithfulness. We find that exceptionally problematic, so we ask: what might it look like to move beyond right and wrong, and into a space where the central concern is helping our brothers and sisters to grow in Christ-likeness? How might the discussion be different if we focused on vocations rather than mandates?

At times, we have caught a glimpse of what this kind of approach might look like. We have been blessed by spiritual directors who can see and affirm our willingness to do our best to live our entire lives fully informed by Christ and our Christian tradition. They understand that we are human and entirely fallible, and when we fall in any way they are ready to give us wise counsel that takes into account our desire to live as Christ calls us. Their recognizing that Christ-likeness is a goal for all Christians has leveled the proverbial playing field and helped us see that every person who seeks Christ needs help along the journey. We find ourselves growing in compassion towards people who would otherwise easily anger, frustrate, or disappoint us. Our spiritual directors have been able to see how Christ has used our relationship to help one another grow in holiness and trust that our primary spiritual struggles are not sexual. Both of us have had spiritual directors in the past who have constantly exhorted us to focus our entire spiritual energies on reigning in our sexual appetites, a focus that is not only inappropriate for our specific circumstances but is significantly alienating. Keeping Christ at the absolute center of spiritual direction creates a space for the Holy Spirit to exhort us to holy living while also giving us time to grow towards Christ. As one prayer from our tradition reminds us, we pray for the grace to “make a good beginning” because our earthly days barely make a dent when viewed against eternity.

We find it critical to speak about the need to offer all LGBT Christians authentic spiritual direction because the vast majority of LGBT Christians have exceptionally limited access to compassionate spiritual directors. While we are absolutely grateful to be able to receive authentic spiritual direction at this time, we are all too aware that our present situation is completely contingent on our current mash-up of local church community, spiritual directors, geography, and even the political climate within our Christian tradition. As evidenced by Maria McDowell’s reflection entitled “Fragile Repentances,” many LGBT Christians find themselves dependent on pastoral whim and on a few friends willing to vouch for their faithfulness. Our vocation to celibacy does not render us immune to the effects of poor spiritual direction. Many past spiritual directors have discounted our experience by stating singleness is the only appropriate form of celibacy for LGBT Christians. From our perspective, several other demographics (teenagers, divorced, widows, single, married) present in the Church do not have to worry as much as being judged by their spiritual directors as “good” or “bad” based on their behavioral track records.

One main function of a spiritual director is to be present as a human who can prayerfully carry the burdens of another person to God. We pray constantly that spiritual directors would realize the profoundly damaging effect that constant clangs of “RIGHT” and “WRONG” can have on a person. Beyond right and wrong, we find ourselves in a place where we can appreciate one another’s humanity, where all vocations are fragile, and where everyone must be nurtured with love.

Comment Policy: Please remember that we, and all others commenting on this blog, are people. Practice kindness. Practice generosity. Practice asking questions. Practice showing love. Practice being human. If your comment is rude, it will be deleted. If you are constantly negative, argumentative, or bullish, you will not be able to comment anymore. We are the sole moderators of the combox.

Expectations of Perfection

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As LGBT Christians in our late 20s and early 30s, we’ve seen many differences in the way people are urged to develop healthy senses of sexuality. Throughout our own journeys in uniting faith and sexuality, we’ve observed time and time again the way many Christian traditions assert that if an LGBT person is sincerely a Christian, then he or she simply will not make any mistakes in the area of sexual morality. This line of thought might come from a belief that it’s adequate to tell a faithful, LGBT Christian to avoid every appearance of evil and give no further counsel.

Why might cisgender, heterosexual Christians expect LGBT Christians to be perfect? Perhaps these expectations come from cisgender, heterosexual Christians trying to get their heads around the idea that “Yes, it is possible to be a gay Christian.” People willing to extend a gay person the benefit of the doubt at times draw what seems to be a razor-thin line that differentiates the “good” gays from the “bad” gays. “Good” gays don’t have sex. When some conservative Christians draw these lines, anything less than perfect abstinence falls short and is understood as evidence that the Holy Spirit is not at work in the life of that gay “Christian.” Here, we see indications of a bit of neo-Pelagianism creeping into the forefront: a faithful gay Christian should be able to provide ample evidence of faithfulness because that person is capable of reigning in his/her sexual energies.

An unhealthy obsession with perfection enters because the LGBT person trying to live a faithful life in the Church zooms in on doing whatever it takes to prevent sexual sin, no matter how extreme. This kind of expectation puts insurmountable pressures on LGBT Christians and leads many of them down the road of questioning their commitment to Christ, their suitability to be in a church community, and their right to continue to draw air. LGBT Christians live on a spiritual fault line where one action has the potential to separate them from the Church. The expectation of perfection creates indescribable fear where they can become terrified to talk with their spiritual mentors, dreading interactions as one would dread a terrorist attack. LGBT Christians can develop practices of rehearsing their parts of the conversation when approaching spiritual direction, if they go at all.

To cope with this pressure, LGBT Christians can acquire a lexicon of various code-switching phrases to try to discuss sexuality safely… but may consistently feel under attack when a member of the clergy decides to read more into that choice of words than the person intended. For example, if the LGBT Christian is talking about concerns involving a close friend, some spiritual directors might assume the person has a sexually active relationship without ever asking if this is the case. Additionally, we’ve noticed that many spiritual directors are more comfortable with particular lexicons. These spiritual directors might encourage people to say they “experience same-sex attraction” rather than saying that they are “gay” or “lesbian,” sometimes going so far as to tell them, “Identifying as ‘gay’ or ‘lesbian’ is denouncing your identity in Christ!”

Expectations of perfection may also emerge because many providers of pastoral care tend to view sexual sin as a type of sin that is around forever and must always be carefully contained. Some of this attitude may stem from how Christian traditions emphasize purity and virginity, especially when encouraging youth to wait until marriage before having sex. Any sexual sin in an LGBT person’s life can lead to extreme consequences within his/her faith community. Once as a young college student, Sarah sought counsel from a priest about how to develop a healthy relationship with a woman after they had experimented with some above-the-waist touching. The priest provided a stern directive that Sarah should never speak to this woman ever again and avoid her in every situation possible because Sarah’s salvation was at risk. Within the same week, one of Sarah’s heterosexual male friends sought advice from the same priest after engaging in sexual intercourse with his girlfriend. Sarah’s friend later told Sarah that the priest’s counsel was simply, “Obey the Church’s teaching that sex is reserved for marriage, and avoid situations like this one with your girlfriend in the future.” When LGBT people have spiritual directors bellowing over them that failure to be perfect endangers their salvation, it should come as no surprise that LGBT Christians can become so focused on trying to be perfect that they begin to hate themselves for being human.

Cisgender, heterosexual people can (and should!) encounter a lot of grace in navigating questions around sexuality, gender identity, and gender expression. Most LGBT Christians are not so fortunate. Part of adolescence involves exploring, finding yourself, and figuring out how to get up when you fall down. No one expects a teenager to have instant control over the hormones raging through his or her body, and everyone can acknowledge the need for gracious support as young adults work to discover themselves in Christ. There’s a certain collection of behaviors that we tend to associate with people at different stages in sexual development. It’s good to match our words of advice with a healthy understanding of a particular person’s likely stage in sexual development. LGBT people need to be afforded the same courtesy as cisgender, heterosexual people. To expect LGBT Christians to prove their faithfulness over and over and over (and over….) again by remaining without sexual sin is to tie up heavy burdens on people without any willingness to lift a finger to help them manage the load.

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